The Nation

The Interior Department said it had eliminated the $25 application fee and taken other steps aimed at making it easier to adopt a wild horse or burro. Robert Burford, director of the Bureau of Land Management, said the fee "seemed to discourage people from applying." In the fiscal year ending last Sept. 30, the bureau rounded up 18,959 wild horses and burros from public lands in the West. On Sept. 30, it had about 9,900 in corrals. The bureau charges $125 for a horse and $75 for a burro.